I am thrilling to test the upcoming Linux Mint 15 Olivia, but I am worrying I wont be able to, if a NON-PAE version will come too.

At the Mint Team attention:

Please, could you be so kind to consider a NON- PAE version? In doing so, you will help many people cannot effort to purchase expensive computers. At the same time, you can benefit of that, more people will help Mint to get a maximum exposure and spread out this wonderful distro, how it sounds that?

Thanks for your attention and I look forward to your positive response.

Respectfully,

Guido

PS I am enjoin Linux Mint since the 6 version and it would be a very sad if I wont do that any more:( I would like to remain loyal to Mint!

This is a valid suggestion and would make installation easier for those that are unfortunate enough to have an older Pentium M or a similar crippled CPU. Linux Mint 15 will use Ubuntu 13.04 as a package base, and AFAIK that again like Ubuntu 12.10 comes without support for non-PAE CPUs.

It is a bit more complex that you would imagine perhaps. The kernels on Linux Mint come from the Ubuntu package base. Those kernels are currently not long-term support kernels, and hence are not supported by the kernel developers. It is the Ubuntu kernel team that maintains these kernels. Including a non-PAE kernel on Linux Mint would mean the developers get another task; maintaining the kernel... That probably goes beyond what the team has time for to do, or at least if nothing has been implemented for this yet it is cutting it close as we are close to moment of release.

This issue was raised at the time of Linux Mint 14 as well, and the recommendation currently is to use the LTS release--Linux Mint 13--for non-PAE CPUs.

Fortunately, there are a lot of ways you can install these Linux Mint versions on non-PAE CPUs. Some users have gotten a kernel from somewhere else and included that on their ISO (can't find the post right now, but here are the steps for Ubuntu 12.10: http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/how-to-i ... n-pae.html). Other users have installed Linux Mint 13 and then upgraded it in place to Linux Mint 14, retaining their non-PAE kernel. Something similar will surely be possible for Linux Mint 15, if no other option is given.

Of course this is a bit more involved and ideally non-PAE would be supported out-of-the-box. I'm hoping that will have been worked for on Linux Mint 15, but I'm not privy to what will happen for Linux Mint 15.

Understood! But for people like myself which is not so expert to do what other user have done as you mentioned would be a bit tougher. But according to "Life Learner Focus" I will be very happy to try thou at list.

Then, apologies if I am insisting and highlighting that issue again, is there any opportunity to add a bit of more time, one task more to connect with Ubuntu Team and maybe bot Mint and Ubuntu could come up with a solution, you never know.

As last resort, I would like to ask you, please, when you have a minute, are you able to find more link where I can learn and try to test something waiting for the Olivia? By that I mean the link you did not find:)

At the mean time, I like to ad: You know how many people on this planet does not have opportunity to be wealthy in purchasing new technology? I am sure you know! My point is something else, if Ubuntu, GNU born for freedom and allow people to get out for the despite Microsoft, why now Ubuntu mission is going toward to build a wall for those people including me? It sounds a bit ipocr....I do not like to use that word, but please, thing about what I mean, my English is still improving, but again, I think you understood my feeling in following the GNU or Linux Freedom accomplishment and then, in front of you there is a final obstacle where you might do a U TURN doing to WEB demanding. I like to point out I wish no one get offended about the above, I just like to understand the meaning of Linux Freedom, for me, now, it's not, that's all:)

guido8 wrote:Then, apologies if I am insisting and highlighting that issue again, is there any opportunity to add a bit of more time, one task more to connect with Ubuntu Team and maybe bot Mint and Ubuntu could come up with a solution, you never know.

The 32bit i686-pae only kernel for Ubuntu 12.10 and newer was exactly to save time (and money). I don't think they are going back.

For now, Mint 13 LTS is a good solution, it has support until 2017 but after that I recommend LMDE or Debian, both should have the i486 kernel that works with non-pae i686 CPU's, i585 and i486.

The 32bit i686-pae only kernel for Ubuntu 12.10 and newer was exactly to save time (and money). I don't think they are going back.

which in itself is going to cause problems for Ubuntu users - and for Mint users

- not everyone has a PC that has that sort of caliber.
- there is still a area of users, that are still recycling old PCs - or laptops.
& these won't be able to run any Ubuntu based O/S that was recently released.

- another case of the Linux fraternity shooting itself in the foot.
and with Win_8 being less than desirable, - at the moment,
this is not a good time to shoot ones foot off . ..

if, the Mint Team could also include a "non-pae" kernel into it's release, then that would only be a good thing.

+1 - for the OPs suggestion.

Please edit your original post title to include [SOLVED] - when your problem is solved!
and DO LOOK at those Unanswered Topics - - you may be able to answer some!.

guido8 wrote:Then, apologies if I am insisting and highlighting that issue again, is there any opportunity to add a bit of more time, one task more to connect with Ubuntu Team and maybe bot Mint and Ubuntu could come up with a solution, you never know.

The 32bit i686-pae only kernel for Ubuntu 12.10 and newer was exactly to save time (and money). I don't think they are going back.

For now, Mint 13 LTS is a good solution, it has support until 2017 but after that I recommend LMDE or Debian, both should have the i486 kernel that works with non-pae i686 CPU's, i585 and i486.

That and it's a good trade off, the only ones that are really effected are the handful of people that are trying to run Ubuntu and derivatives on a Banias core Pentium M or something older then the Pentium Pro. Thus the probability of someone actually needing the non PAE kernel is quite low compared to the number of people that are using the 32 bit kernel and likely have more then 3Gb of ram or a pre 64 bit CPU. There are quite a few people with 64 bit CPUs and more then 4Gb of ram running 32 bit for various reasons that leave having the 32 bit libs on a 64bit kernel not an option. PAE alows for up to 64Gb of ram to be useable on a 32 bit kernel.

While on the other hand you have the multitude of people coming over from Windows that don't realize that Windows lies about the amount of system ram available and will thus complain that there is something wrong with Linux because it accurately reports that due to the 32 bit 4Gb allocation limit that the system ram is 3Gb or less depending on their GPU ram and other hardware caches because they grabbed the wrong version.

You can roll your own Mint install with the non PAE kernel, or you can try another distro as has been stated.

guido8 wrote:
...For now, Mint 13 LTS is a good solution, it has support until 2017 but after that I recommend LMDE or Debian, both should have the i486 kernel that works with non-pae i686 CPU's, i585 and i486.

...You can roll your own Mint install with the non PAE kernel, or you can try another distro as has been stated.

But does this mean that, at some point, even LMDE or even Debian will also require a processor with PAE support? I've tried LMDE on my Pentium M (with that "Centrino" sticker on it) and I can say that, indeed, it works... but there were a number of drawbacks at least for my Intel 82852/855GM chipset (which really deserves it's own new topic/thread). I doubt many of the recent converts from "Winblows" would know what they're doing if they had to "roll" their own Mint installs, as you say... I know I wouldn't. Do you mean something like what user linuxopjemac did to make MintPPC for PPC-based Macs?

MintPPC 9 = Debian Squeeze + Mint LXDE Isadora

MintPPC 11 = Debian Wheezy + Mint LXDE Katya (this is where it is currently... i know because i'm essentially stuck with it on my iMac G3, me not wanting to go with just plain-Debian! )